Is it true that "anything we can actually do we can afford”? — Simon Wren-Lewis

 Simon Wren-Lewis is not yet an MMT convert but moving closer. He is still clinging to the illusion of monetary policy effectiveness and in this piece he does not address the MMT critique of monetary policy. Moreover, he thinks that a floating rate system requires monetary policy rather than freeing the need for it as under a fixed rate convertible system in which interest rate policy addresses demand for conversion. 

His answer to the question, Is it true that "anything we can actually do we can afford”?, is sort of. That is, yes, with qualifiers. MMT would agree with this although there might be some disagreement over the qualifiers. 

But the take-away is his agreement with MMT that the state does have a "magic money tree," and the constraint is inflation.

While Simon Wren-Lewis doesn't mention it, and in fact, he assumes that central banks have the knowledge and tools they need, the issue then becomes a testable theory of inflation and how to control price stability. But is it so? Former Fed governor Daniel Tarullo wrote a paper questioning this.

Anyway, worth a read.

Mainly Macro
Is it true that "anything we can actually do we can afford”?
Simon Wren-Lewis | Emeritus Professor of Economics, Oxford University

NRx and Israel Developing Covid-19 Vaccine to Attack Variants

 It's possible we could eliminate Covid eventually, except millions of people will probably refuse the vaccine. I never thought so many people would be influenced by that crack pot, David Icke. 

Aug.30 -- NRx Pharmaceuticals CEO Dr. Jonathan Javitt says they are working with Israel on a Covid-19 vaccine that targets Covid variants. He says vaccines from last year are becoming less effective. He's on "Bloomberg Markets."

NRx and Israel Developing Covid-19 Vaccine to Attack Variants

Anti-vaxxer contracts COVID-19, regrets conspiracy theories | A Current Affair 

Amanda Gulasi says she can't shake the regret she feels for believing conspiracy theorists on social media over health experts urging Australians to get vaccinated, as she now battles COVID-19 at her home in Sydney's south-west

https://youtu.be/5aX45NwZ1YE

I don't recommend that anyone who holds contrarian views watch this, well, you know what Cenk Uygur is like.

Florida's COVID Surge Is An Absolute DISASTER

COVID has gotten so out of hand in Florida that the City of Orlando is asking people to conserve water to maintain liquid oxygen supplies at hospitals. Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur discuss on The Young Turks. Watch LIVE 

https://youtu.be/iLMsRFotTrU

Investor John Paulson calls cryptocurrency 'worthless bubble'

Crypto will probably be zooming again next year. I agree with John Paulson, though, it's backed by nothing, so could dissappear overnight. I think he describes it quiet succinctly. 

He also predicts that massive inflation may coming soon, but let's hope not.

 

"cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum, which promise independence from governments and large financial institutions, 'will eventually prove to be worthless,' 

"'Once the exuberance wears off, or liquidity dries up, they will go to zero. I wouldn’t recommend anyone invest in cryptocurrencies,' he said.

He added: 'I would describe them as a limited supply of nothing. So to the extent there’s more demand than the limited supply, the price would go up. But to the extent the demand falls, then the price would go down. There’s no intrinsic value to any of the cryptocurrencies except that there’s a limited amount.'

The Mail 

Investor John Paulson calls cryptocurrency 'worthless bubble' 

CGTN - Huawei CFO, Meng Wanzhou, still detained in Canada

The US sponsors kidnappings in foreign countries 

Huawei’s chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, has been detained in Canada now for over 1,000 days as she fights extradition to the United States. Political and economic affairs commentator  Einar Tangen discusses.

CGTN - Huawei CFO, Meng Wanzhou, still detained in Canada

Dr John Campbell - Important announcement

Herd immunity will not come

You don't need to get a vaccine now as the new Delta variant means everyone will get Covid, although the infected unvaccinated will become a burden to hospitals, taking up their valuable time and resources, as well as causing unnecessary expense 

I will be getting a third booster covid vaccine along with the flu shot when it's offered here in the UK. 

 Andrew Pollard, Oxford vaccine team

Clear that the delta variant can infect people already vaccinated

Making herd immunity impossible to reach even with high vaccine uptake

Anyone who is still unvaccinated will, at some point, meet the virus. 

We don't have anything that will stop transmission, 

so I think we are in a situation where herd immunity is not a possibility

and I suspect the virus will throw up a new variant that is even better at infecting vaccinated individuals

Angela Merkel

Ending free testing from Oct 11

Department of Health

https://www.gov.uk/government/collect...

UK vaccination, prevented 60,000 deaths and 66,900 hospitalisations

Never be enough to stop Covid from spreading

Winter wave inevitable

Professor Paul Hunter, University of East Anglia

The concept of herd immunity is unachievable

because we know the infection will spread in unvaccinated populations

and the latest data is suggesting that two doses is probably only 50 percent protective

Time to change the way the data is collected and recorded as the virus becomes endemic

We need to start moving away from just reporting infections, 

or just reporting positive cases admitted to hospital, 

to actually start reporting the number of people who are ill because of Covid

Otherwise we are going to be frightening ourselves with very high numbers that actually don't translate into disease burden

Sajid Javid

Preparations to offer Covid booster jabs from next month

Waiting for the final advice from the JCVI

Over-50s set to be offered the flu jab at the same time as booster.

Dr John Campbell - Important announcement

Ramanan — Keynes, Robinson And Mercantilism

What is the “new mercantilism”? Joan Robinson says:
…

Nowadays governments are concerned not just to maintain employment, but to make national income grow. Nevertheless, the capitalist world is still always somewhat of a buyer’s market, in the sense that capacity to produce exceeds what can be sold at a profitable price. Some countries have experienced spells of excessive demand, but this corrects itself only too soon. The chronic condition for industrial enterprise is to be looking round anxiously for prospects of sales. Since the total market does not grow fast enough to make room for all, each government feels it a worthy and commendable aim to increase its own share in world activity for the benefit of its own people.

This is the new mercantilism.

The Case for Concerted Action
Keynes, Robinson And Mercantilism
V. Ramanan

Primer: Quantity Theory Of Money — Brian Romanchuk

Note: This is an unedited excerpt from my inflation primer manuscript.

Even if we put aside the atypical argument that an increase in the money supply is how to define inflation, there is a widespread belief that increasing the money supply causes inflation (as normally defined). These beliefs can be traced back to what is termed the Quantity Theory of Money, which has a long history in economic thinking.

I am extremely allergic to the Quantity Theory of Money. That said, my plan within this book is to stay away from theoretical controversies, and so will attempt to offer as neutral as possible description without inflicting too much pain on myself.

Although I refer to this as The Quantity Theory of Money, there are a few variants, with a long history. My impression is that the most reputable version of the theory is the “equation of exchange” variant. As I discuss below, this variant is not obviously wrong, rather it has the problem that it says very little in practice. As for the other variants, I mainly see various phrasings in popular discussion that have obvious defects, which are not tied to modern economic theory (at best, some garbled version of some dubious assertions made in mainstream Economics 101 textbooks).

Bond Economics
Primer: Quantity Theory Of Money
Brian Romanchuk

The power of dominant capital continues to rise — Jonathan Nitzan and Shimshon Bichler

Here we show the after-tax profit and market capitalization of the top 0.01% of U.S.-based corporations, expressed as a % of U.S. GDP....

Nitzan and Bichler view "capitalism" (monetary production economy with private property) as the ongoing struggle for power between capital and labor. Concentrated capital (monopoly and oligopoly power) is winning hands down in this round.

Real-World Economics Review Blog
The power of dominant capital continues to rise

Jonathan Nitzan and Shimshon Bichler

See also

Economics from the Top Down

With Great Power Comes Great Fear

Blair Fix

Related

The Intercept
The Great American Science Heist
Alexander Zaitchik

Completing the unfinished New Deal to overcome 21st century U.S. economic inequality — David Mitchell

But even President Biden’s “big” rhetoric doesn’t fully capture the scope of his policy ambitions. He wants nothing less than to complete the unfinished business of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s 1930s-era New Deal, once again rejecting fiscal austerity while correcting for racist carve-outs, filling in the holes in our social and care infrastructure, and investing to abate the increasingly dire consequences of climate change. And he wants to demonstrate that the federal government—and the democratic processes undergirding it—can deliver for everyday workers and their families in the United States.

Congress too has embraced this “unfinished New Deal” rhetoric, even going so far as to establish a Select Committee in the House of Representatives explicitly modeled on the FDR-era Temporary National Economic Committee, which was launched in 1938 to study the deleterious effects of overly concentrated economic power. The new House Select Committee on Economic Disparity and Fairness in Growth, chaired by Rep. Jim Himes (D-CT), promises to “develop solutions to the key economic issue of our time: the yawning prosperity gap between wealthy Americans and everyone else.”...

Two philosophies colllide — the market state versus the managerial state. China has already taken the decision and also the lead in this. Will the US follow or continue on the neoliberal road to social and political dysfunction? 

WCEG — The Equitablog
Completing the unfinished New Deal to overcome 21st century U.S. economic inequality
David Mitchell

Bill Mitchell — The dying embers of New Keynesian reasoning

Lawrence Summers is a New Keynesian economist. That means something. While there are nuances that exist between members of that school of thought, mostly to do with policy sensitivities and speeds of adjustment, the New Keynesian paradigm has demonstrated clearly that it is incapable of capturing the macroeconomic dynamics in any consistent manner, despite it being the dominant approach in the profession. So, it is no wonder when Summers provides opinions the underlying logic he demonstrates is similarly flawed. Unfortunately, he keeps getting important platforms to express these opinions, which continues to blight the public policy debate. He was at it again when he started lecturing the US Federal Reserve Bank on the conduct of its asset-purchasing program.….

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
The dying embers of New Keynesian reasoning
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

State University of New York College at Buffalo - Buffalo State College - Whose Monster? A Study in the Rise to Power of alQaeda and the Taliban

The Fascinating Photos of Afghanistan in the 1960's and 1970's. 

Afghanistan before the US and Pakistan turned it into a hell hole. The report also talked about different tribal groups fighting over Afghanistan’s resources funded by Pakistan. 

https://youtu.be/OP17WjQOrSY

Whose Monster? A Study in the Rise to Power of alQaeda and the Taliban

The majority of the academic writing on the emerging subject of the Taliban and al Qaeda’s ascent tend to place the blame squarely at the feet of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) for funding the mujahedeen, many of whom would eventually go on to have rather successful careers as members of either the Taliban or al Qaeda, with the most famous of all obviously being Osama bin Laden. The most famous of the books written about the CIA’s role in the formation of al Qaeda and the Taliban is George Crile’s Charlie Wilson’s War, also written in the wake of the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which describes how the playboy congressman from Texas convinced his colleagues, with the help of a friend in the CIA and several other sources, funded the mujahedeen in their fight against the invading Soviet Union, who was America’s archnemesis at the time. Unfortunately, as evident when he said “My God, what have we done?”, upon first seeing about the 9/11 attacks on the news, he did not fully comprehend the possibility that the rebels that he authorized the CIA to assist could someday turn their backs on their benefactors.2 The book, which honestly reads more like a novel than a scholarly work, received even more attention when it was later adapted into a popular motion picture starring Tom Hanks and Julia Roberts. Charlie Wilson is not the only work that supports this theory of blowback. Steve Coll also believes that 9/11 and the rash of al Qaeda attacks on American targets throughout the 1990s was a direct result of ignorance on the part of the CIA. Coll’s work not only outlines the numerous blunders made by the CIA and its associate organizations both during and after the Soviet-Afghan War, but also provides an intimate look at the lives of the mujahedeen rebels who sought to keep the Red Army out of their homeland. Another book which considers the CIA to be chiefly responsible for both 9/11 and the aforementioned spate of al Qaeda attacks in the 1990s is Peter Dale Scott’s The Road to 9/11: Wealth, Empire, and the Future of America3. This tome posits that a “deep state” truly pulls the strings of America’s government and has been desperately trying to conceal the many crimes that have committed around the globe in the name of preserving America’s empire. 

The truth is that the CIA was only one of a myriad of factors that contributed to the Taliban and al Qaeda’s reign of terror in both Afghanistan and a large swath of the Western world. One factor was their immediate neighbor to the east, Pakistan, who likely viewed Afghanistan as a powerful buffer against potential aggression from their archnemesis India. Although both Peter Dale Scott and Michael Griffin both noted that the CIA did give generously to the mujahedeen in their jihad against the Soviet Union, the Inter-Services Intelligence, Pakistan’s version of the CIA, had the final say on who received the monies. Unfortunately for the United States, Pakistan preferred to fund the more fundamentalist-leaning members of the mujahedeen such as Gulbuddin Hekmatyar than the considerably more moderate fighters, such as Ahmad Shah Masood, that the CIA would have rather helped. In addition to Pakistan, Saudi Arabia (who Osama bin Laden’s family’s construction company had a close business relationship with) also has been accused of being a major benefactor to the Taliban and al Qaeda, likely in no small part due to the fact that the Wahhabi school of Islam practiced in Saudi Arabia is strikingly similar to Islam as it was practiced in Afghanistan during the Taliban’s rule there. Scott and Crile both offer excellent explanations as to just how close the relationship was between Saudi Arabia and the Taliban. 

Whose Monster? A Study in the Rise to Power of alQaeda and the Taliban

Zero Hedge — Beijing's Big Tech Crackdown Causes Private Deal Flow To Dry Up In August

 Buying opportunities?

The sudden evaporation of deal flow has certainly gotten the investing community's attention, but at the end of the day, China is simply too large of a market for PE firms to ignore. So few expect it to last long.

Jeffrey Lee, a partner at China-focused venture capital firm NLVC headquartered in Beijing, said robotics and manufacturing automation has been an increasingly hot sector. While more caution and strategy shifts are warranted, exiting China entirely would be out of the question, he said.

"The hard reality is that you can't find a replacement for the sheer size of the economy, the next phase of its growth and -- despite all of the criticism toward the government -- the level of institutional development, whether it's in roads or bridges, or whether it's in the banking system," Lee said. "It just doesn't exist anywhere else in the world."

VC interest in consumer-focused businesses that are bearing the brunt of Beijing's crackdown now is also unlikely to shrivel entirely.

"Ultimately there are a lot of consumers in China, and a lot of rising middle-class consumers who are willing to spend," said Joshua Chao, senior analyst at PitchBook. "There's a strong reason to say that consumer businesses are still gonna do pretty well in China.".…

This will be a blip on the screen over time. China is just getting a hand on things that were getting out of hand. The leadership has the example of the West to draw on for what happens with lax regulation, cultural decay, and unbridled accumulation at the top — social dysfunction and deterioration of cohesion, exacerbated by obscene inequality. 

China has a traditional culture, and it is not going there, much to the chagrin of the Western liberalizers, who are dismissive of the cost to society.

Zero Hedge
Beijing's Big Tech Crackdown Causes Private Deal Flow To Dry Up In August

Tyler Durden

The ‘Great Reset’ in Microcosm: “Data Driven Defeat” in Afghanistan — Alastair Crooke

The flaw was that Afghanistan as a liberal progressive vision was a hoax in the first place: Afghanistan was invaded, and occupied, because of its geography. It was the ideal platform from which to perturb Central Asia, and thus unsettle Russia and China.

Exactly. This was the real mission, and the rest was an excuse to justify liberal interventionism as cover for the hidden geopolitical and geostrategic agenda of US global hegemony. The excuse also became the excuse for gorging at the public trough, like several trillion US. But China's unexpected and unanticipated swift rise necessitated a recalculation of resource deployment, which Donald Trump had already begun with his economic warfare of tariffs and sanctions. So here we are, preparing for a two-front war with Russia and China before China becomes dominant militarily. That window is shutting fast, and it already may be too late.

Geopolitika

The ‘Great Reset’ in Microcosm: “Data Driven Defeat” in Afghanistan

Alastair Crooke | founder and director of the Conflicts Forum, and former British diplomat and senior figure in British intelligence and in European Union diplomacy

See also

Strategic Culture Foundation
A ‘Strategic Apocalypse’ in Afghanistan: A Seismic Shift, Years in the Making
Alastair Crooke | founder and director of the Conflicts Forum, and former British diplomat and senior figure in British intelligence and in European Union diplomacy

Enduring Terror Forever: from al-Qaeda to ISIS-K — Pepe Escobar

Backgrounder. The plot thickens.

The Vineyard of the Saker
Enduring Terror Forever: from al-Qaeda to ISIS-K
Pepe Escobar

See also

Moon of Alabama
Ukraine Shuts Down Opposition Media - U.S. Ambassador Applauds 'Daring Act', Calls For Support

WHO - From 30 million cases to zero: China is certified malaria-free by WHO

Socialism with Chinese characteristics, which some say is rooted in Confucianism. 

 In 1967, the Chinese Government launched the “523 Project” – a nation-wide research proramme aimed at finding new treatments for malaria. This effort, involving more than 500 scientists from 60 institutions, led to the discovery in the 1970s of artemisinin – the core compound of artemisinin-based combination therapies (ACTs), the most effective antimalarial drugs available today.

“Over many decades, China’s ability to think outside the box served the country well in its own response to malaria, and also had a significant ripple effect globally,” notes Dr Pedro Alonso, Director of the WHO Global Malaria Programme. “The Government and its people were always searching for new and innovative ways to accelerate the pace of progress towards elimination.”

Keys to success

China provides a basic public health service package for its residents free of charge. As part of this package, all people in China have access to affordable services for the diagnosis and treatment of malaria, regardless of legal or financial status

WHO

WHO - From 30 million cases to zero: China is certified malaria-free by WHO

Confucianism

The main idea of Confucianism is the importance of having a good moral character, which can then affect the world around that person through the idea of “cosmic harmony.” If the emperor has moral perfection, his rule will be peaceful and benevolent. Natural disasters and conflict are the result of straying from the ancient teachings. This moral character is achieved through the virtue of ren, or “humanity,” which leads to more virtuous behaviours, such as respect, altruism, and humility. Confucius believed in the importance of education in order to create this virtuous character. He thought that people are essentially good yet may have strayed from the appropriate forms of conduct. Rituals in Confucianism were designed to bring about this respectful attitude and create a sense of community within a group.

National Geographic

Confucianism

David Kessler and William Shatner - Why are we afraid of death?

Death is inevitable for everyone. Our instinct as humans is to stay alive, but death will come to us all at some point, so why are we so fearful of it?  Do all cultures view death the same way? And why are some people more fascinated by death than others? One of the world’s foremost experts on healing and loss David Kessler joins William Shatner on this week's episode of 'I Don't Understand'  to help explain the concept of death and why it’s so scary for us

David Kessler and William Shatner - Why are we afraid of death?

Links — 30 August 2021

India Punchline (inflection point rather than crossroads?)
US-China relations at crossroads
M. K. Bhadrakumar | retired diplomat with the Indian Foreign Service

TASS (FM Lavrov takes the gloves off)
US sets itself goal to destroy the unity of world Orthodox Christianity, Lavrov says

West seeks to influence results of upcoming election in Russia, Lavrov says

West has demonstrated its unreliability as partner, says Russian top diplomat

British special services in close contact with some Russian media — Foreign Ministry

CGTN: How will China, a unified multi-ethnic country, address ethnic affairs in new era?

British PM names conditions for diplomatic recognition of Taliban

Asia Times (backrounder)
Who profits from the Kabul suicide bombing?

Pepe Escobar

ECNS
China moves to reduce examination pressure faced by students (good move)

Xi says China willing to walk together with Cuba in building socialism

New Cold War ("myth" = propaganda)
The Media Myth of ‘Once Prosperous’ and Democratic Venezuela Before Chávez
Catherine Davies

Politico (America no longer welcoming)
As Biden winds down Afghanistan, a refugee backlash looms at home

Anita Kumar

SouthFront ("democratic" torch marches)
Far-Right Ideology Has Cemented Itself In Ukraine Under Zelensky

Paul Antonopoulos

Moon of Alabama (the empire of chaos)
How The CIA Used ISIS-K To Keep Its Afghanistan Business

Internatoinalist 360º
US Deploys Mercenaries for Surveillance and Physical Assault of Activists

Open Democracy (a dominant trend in the 21st c. is and will continue to be decolonization)
Delivering reparatory justice means uprooting the legacies of colonialism
Keston K. Perry

Bill Mitchell — Brexit is delivering better pay for British workers (on average)

I find it amusing when some self-styled ‘progressive’ commentator, usually writing in the UK Guardian newspaper, bemoans Brexit and points to claims by business that there is a shortage of workers. The ‘shortage’, of course, is results from not being able to access unlimited supplies of cheap foreign workers as easily as before. When I see a shortage of workers, I celebrate, because it means employers will have to break out of their keep wages growth low mentality to attract labour; that they will have to offer adequate skills training to ensure the workers can do the work required; and, that unemployment will be driven as low as can be. What is not good about that? Brexit has done a lot of things, one of them being to provide the British working class to arrest the degradation in their labour market conditions that neoliberalism has wrought in a context of plenty of low wage labour always being in surplus. A similar thing will come from the pandemic in Australia where our external border has been shut for nearly 18 months now....

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Brexit is delivering better pay for British workers (on average)
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

DW - How China built the best high-speed rail ever

The video shows how neoliberalism and privatisation has failed the West. We're going backwards, while China is going forewords. Some criticism of China, but where people wouldn't move, China just builds its carriageways around them, which hardly authoritarian. 

China built almost 40,000 kilometers of high-speed rails in just over a decade. Meanwhile, dreams for a similar high-speed train systems in the EU and US have been consistently derailed. How did China do it? And at what cost? 

We're destroying our environment at an alarming rate. But it doesn't need to be this way. Our new channel Planet A explores the shift towards an eco-friendly world — and challenges our ideas about what dealing with climate change means. We look at the big and the small: What we can do and how the system needs to change. Every Friday we'll take a truly global look at how to get us out of this mess.

DW - How China built the best high-speed rail ever

I love trains! A really nice relaxation video.

FIRST CLASS Relaxation [ 3,3Hz Delta ] Binaural Beats Sleep Music - Heal Insomnia

https://youtu.be/Rl5vQE1xAnU

Iceland Bans Sociopaths from Government

 Reykjavik, Iceland – The government of Iceland passed a measure today banning sociopaths from holding jobs in the government. The new statute dubbed The Anti-Trump Decree takes effect immediately and covers both elected and non-elected positions.

Prime Minister Andrew Canard remarked on this step forward. “We keep looking at how the wheels have fallen off the car in America. Our citizens are determined to protect our way of life from power-hungry politicians who have no empathy

Pathos 

Iceland Bans Sociopaths from Government

*Note: This is a satirical video* 

Iceland is the land of religious freedom for atheists. In this promotional video, the country of Iceland boasts its natural wonders and how it has a travel ban on televangelists and a warning label on every Bible.

Iceland

FT - Isis Uighurs threaten ‘rivers of blood’ in China

 Video denounces ‘communist lackeys’ as tensions rise in Muslim-majority Xinjiang

A gruesome Isis video depicting Uighur fighters in Iraq calling for attacks on China has raised concern that the Asian nation could become a target for jihadist groups, even as Beijing stages mass military manoeuvres designed to quell separatist sentiment in the restive frontier region of Xinjiang.

The graphic video denouncing “evil Chinese communist infidel lackeys” came from the Iraqi arm of the militant group, according to Site, a US-based company that tracks jihadis and white supremacist activities online. Reuters, which first reported on the video, independently confirmed the translation.

FT

FT - Isis Uighurs threaten ‘rivers of blood’ in China

Rodney Wins A Children's Painting Competition | Only Fools and Horses

 Rodney's painting from 12 years ago wins a week's holiday in Majorca for three.

Rodney Wins A Children's Painting Competition | Only Fools and Horses

Dying in the Name of Vaccine Freedom | NYT Opinion

In the video [below] , Alexander Stockton, a producer on the Opinion Video team, explores two of the main reasons the number of Covid cases is soaring once again in the United States: vaccine hesitancy and refusal.

“It’s hard to watch the pandemic drag on as Americans refuse the vaccine in the name of freedom,” he says.

Seeking understanding, Mr. Stockton travels to Mountain Home, Ark., in the Ozarks, a region with galloping contagion and — not unrelated — abysmal vaccination rates.

He finds that a range of feelings and beliefs underpins the low rates — including fear, skepticism and a libertarian strain of defiance.

This doubt even extends to the staff at a regional hospital, where about half of the medical personnel are not vaccinated — even while the intensive care unit is crowded with unvaccinated Covid patients fighting for their lives.

Mountain Home — like the United States as a whole — is caught in a tug of war between private liberty and public health. But Mr. Stockton suggests that unless government upholds its duty to protect Americans, keeping the common good in mind, this may be a battle with no end.

Dying in the Name of Vaccine Freedom | NYT Opinion

The Young Turks

Anti-Mask 'Freedom Rally' Organizer Seriously Ill With COVID

Anti-Mask 'Freedom Rally' Organizer Seriously Ill With COVID

What Every American Needs to Know About the Congressional "Pay-For" Game (Part 3) Stephanie Kelton

The only wining move is not to play

The Lens
What Every American Needs to Know About the Congressional "Pay-For" Game (Part 3)

MMT ≠ QE

Stephanie Kelton | Professor of Public Policy and Economics at Stony Brook University, formerly Democrats' chief economist on the staff of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee, and an economic adviser to the 2016 presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders

Do wild animals get PTSD? Scientists probe its evolutionary roots

Many creatures show lasting changes in behavior and physiology after a traumatic experience

They're terrified! I'm not surprised. 

In recent years, though, researchers have come to a startling conclusion: Hare numbers fall from their peak not just because predators eat too many of them. There’s another factor, too: Chronic stress from living surrounded by killers causes mother hares to eat less food and bear fewer babies. The trauma of living through repeated predator chases triggers lasting changes in brain chemistry that parallel those seen in the brains of traumatized people. Those changes keep the hares from reproducing at normal levels, even after their predators have died off.

The reasons to fear are clear. Recent studies have found that up to 32 percent of adult female giraffes in the Serengeti carry scars from lion attacks, 25 percent of harbor porpoises in the southern North Sea have claw and bite marks from gray seals and 100 percent of manta rays in some African waters bear multiple bite wounds from sharks. These survivors may carry memories of terror along with their physical scars.

Knowable Magazine 

Do wild animals get PTSD? Scientists probe its evolutionary roots

Paths Not Taken — Joel Andreas

Review of Isabella Weber, How China Escaped Shock Therapy: The Market Reform Debate, Routledge: Abingdon 2021.

Under Xi, China is further retrenching in favor of more moderate economic growth with distributed prosperity rather than pursuing maximization "rationally," where "rational" means in the Western theoretical mode.

Isabella Weber gives the historical precedent and comparison with shock therapy in Russia. It appears that China is taking a more pragmatic approach to transitioning into the contemporary global economy dominated by neoliberalism.

New Left Review
Paths Not Taken
Joel Andreas

Jack Ma and the Chinese tech titans’ mission to give away billions

Xi Jinping’s focus on ‘common prosperity’ has galvanised the country’s wealthiest entrepreneurs

Are the Chinese onto something, allowing  people to become rich through their innovation and hard work, but not to the point that it creates a winner take all society? Despite the system that created so much wealth, so quickly, the young Chinese got fed up the wealth inequality and asked for more socialism, and the CPC listened. It will be interesting to see how this pans out as it flies in the face of Western  neoclassical economic theory. 

 The Chinese Communist Party's focus on wealth redistribution intensified this month after Xi called for stronger regulation of “excessively high incomes” and moves to “encourage high-income groups and enterprises to return more to society”.

The Chinese leader, whose comments were carried by state media after a high-level economic planning meeting last week, also reiterated that China’s realisation of “common prosperity” was the essential requirement of socialism

FT -

Jack Ma and the Chinese tech titans’ mission to give away billions

Tara Mooknee - Covid deniers put flyers through my door. Let's debunk them.

 This won't suit the contrarians, but if you are with me in this, you'll love it!

Tara Mooknee - Covid deniers put flyers through my door. Let's debunk them.

‘The smartest person in any room anywhere’: in defence of Elon Musk, by Douglas Coupland

 He’s the Silicon Valley Übermensch, the maverick boss of Tesla and SpaceX who wants us to colonise Mars and who can wipe out billions of dollars with a single tweet. So what’s not to love?

The left are not keen in Elon Musk, but I don't think he's that bad. There's always  going to be smart rich people, so best to encourage the nicer ones. I think the criticism should be aimed at the system itself, which can allocate so much wealth to a few individuals. Just the same, Elon Musk may have done us all a favour by speeding up the production of electric vehicles, where apart from producing less CO2, they will make our cities so much quiter. I know the manufacturing of Tesla cars is very polluting, but it's a step in the right direction, and battery technology will improve in time. 

But self-driving cars will kill people!

Grow up.

Musk didn’t just generate a few fundamental patents and move to Santa Barbara to golf for the rest of his life. Every day he tries to reinvent the wheel and it’s working. Shopped online lately? Ever wanted to visit the International Space Station? Want a new car? With cars alone, Musk pretty much single-handedly shamed and forced the global auto industry to accelerate the electric car rollout by seven to 10 years. Yet people kvetch, and it makes me wonder if there is something fundamentally flawed about our era that it is almost impossible to get people to say something nice about pretty much anyone else. A “like” given to someone else is a like that could have instead gone to oneself, which I suppose indicates that there’s something fundamentally different about selfhood than, say, 25 years ago. I pick 1996 because it seems to me to have been the acme of the celebrity profile – remember them? In Vanity Fair, say. The glossy cover. The fawning. The expectation of dirt revealed. Will they backstab? Even the interviewers were famous for interviewing, and it all feels like a million years ago. Are there any celebrity interviewers left? Oprah, I guess, but her heart doesn’t seem to really be in it, and she now seems to be merely an enabling conduit for the Megan-and-Harry feelings politics that blights our era.

The Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/aug/29/the-smartest-person-in-any-room-anywhere-in-defence-of-elon-musk-by-douglas-coupland

World’s first virtual train track unveiled in central China

https://youtu.be/Dd3N9CFKe9M

Raghuram Rajan, the guru who foresaw the 2008 financial crisis, puts UK on red alert for potential troubles ahead

I haven't changed my position on this, and lockdowns can save the economy, which has been shown in China, but we screwed that one up, so we may need to reconsider further lockdowns if they can harm the economy. But I still blame the people who refused to wear masks, to do social distancing, and who are now refusing to have vaccines, making the pandemic much worse, and further harming our economy. 

 The markets guru who was credited with predicting the 2008 financial crash has warned that Britain faces rampant inflation if businesses keep getting hammered by lockdowns. 

Raghuram Rajan, former governor of the Reserve Bank of India and onetime chief economist at the International Monetary Fund, said businesses could keep raising prices if they face heavy costs from repeated lockdowns, and find they can successfully pass on those costs to consumers.

Raghuram Rajan, the guru who foresaw the 2008 financial crisis, puts UK on red alert for potential troubles ahead

No shortages here

 

Looks like plenty of guns.... some good values too.... 

Here comes China: Afghanistan, 7 Deadly Sins, Space, Common Prosperity — Godfree Roberts

From Godfree Roberts weekly letter.

The Vineyard of the Saker
Here comes China: Afghanistan, 7 Deadly Sins, Space, Common Prosperity
The Saker

China records zero cases of the Delta variant in a world-first

China is the first country to prove they can crush the Delta outbreak after reporting zero locally acquired cases for the first time since July.

On Monday, the country reported 21 imported cases and zero locally transmitted infections. If the trend continues, China could become the world's first country to control a major Delta outbreak.

The country has been tackling the spread of the highly contagious variant since it was first detected in airport cleaning staff in the eastern city of Nanjing on July 20.

Sky News

https://www.skynews.com.au/world-news/china/china-records-zero-cases-of-the-delta-variant-in-a-worldfirst/news-story/

Jason Lightfoot - China's Delta Outbreak is OUT of CONTROL!? I was Wrong? 中国被德尔塔摧毁？Unseen ...

 They say it's authoritian in China, but they are freer than us, plus economy doing well. 

https://youtu.be/cAY5OMV0gg8

Xi’s leftward shift to a socialist China is for real — Katsuji Nakazawa

Alongside the investigation into Zhou, the party’s Central Commission for Discipline Inspection announced it has launched a widespread campaign to root out inappropriate government-business ties. Some 25,000 officials will be subject to a probe.

The announcement signals that no stone will be left unturned. The investigation will cover not only local bureaucrats but also their spouses, their children, their children’s spouses and former local bureaucrats who retired within the past three years.…

About five years ago, Xi began advocating for a “new type of government-business relations.” This means that while listening to the voices of struggling private companies with familiarity and seriousness, and while resolving problems, politicians must maintain their purity and not take advantage of their power for personal gain.…

MR Online

Xi’s leftward shift to a socialist China is for real

Originally published: Nikkei Asia by Katsuji Nakazawa (August 26, 2021

Also At MR

If the U.S. wants to be a world leader, it has to match China in investing in knowledge generation for future technology. Why then is the U.S. taking the sanctions route? Sanctions are simpler to implement; building a society that values knowledge is much more difficult. This is the crisis of late capitalism.…

Chip wars or the crisis of late capitalism?
Prabir Purkayastha /

George Galloway - These Savages Are Us

 These head-chopping obscurantists the Taliban would never had existed but for us. We spent blood and treasure in oceanic proportions and we rubbed the lamp and conjured forth these satanic demons.

7.4M at risk of eviction

 

Hmmm…. Looks like the Fed needs to remove accommodation things are going too well… or in the figurative language of the Art Degree morons trying to run this thing “remove the punch bowl!” … I guess these Art degree people think everybody is just having too good a time…

"Here's why the Supreme Court just voted to expose millions to risk of eviction" https://t.co/YA5mkOersZ

— TheBlkCassanova (@CassanovaBlk) August 28, 2021

ZDoggMD - Top 3 Covid Vaccines Myths Explained

Zero Hedge quoted an Israeli study that said, 

'This Ends The Debate' - Israeli Study Shows Natural Immunity 13x More Effective Than Vaccines At Stopping Delta

Except, I might add, with millions dead in the process, and with millions more going through the misery of Covid-19, plus others left with long covid. 

It's a no brainer, get a jab, and if this research is correct and you get Covid, it will boost your immunity further. This research changes nothing. 

A vaccine, or this. Ted Nugent on his Covid infection. He thought he was dying! 

One person has been said to have died from a blood clot in the brain from a vaccine, but Covid kills even more through blood clots. They are looking at the spike protein, but it could be that the vaccine is entering the blood stream and not the muscle, so they are looking into that too, which is easy to put right. The Sputnik vaccine is not associated with blood clots yet. 

I don't know what all the fuss is about, as there are better things to fight for your freedoms over rather than a vaccine that is far more safer than covid itself. 

ZDoggMD says people are right to ask questions about the vaccines, but he explains why you should still get one.

Top 3 Covid Vaccines Myths Explained 

ZDoggMD - Top 3 Covid Vaccines Myths Explained

Blowback: Taliban target US intel's shadow army — Pepe Escobar

Behind the scenes.

The Cradle
Blowback: Taliban target US intel's shadow army
Pepe Escobar

The Sunni track: How the US plans to re-insert itself into Afghanistan

M. K. Bhadrakumar | retired diplomat with the Indian Foreign Service

Geopolitika
Obama Defense Secretary ALREADY Calling For Fresh Military Occupation Of Afghanistan

China’s Top Court Says Grueling ‘996’ Work Schedule Illegal — Fan Yiying

Chinese authorities said it’s illegal for companies to make employees work extended hours and terminate their contracts for not following excruciating work schedules commonly known as “996” — 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week.

China’s Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and the Supreme People’s Court jointly published several real-life scenarios on Thursday to clarify the country’s legal standards on working hours and overtime wages. The 10 cases are meant as a reference for local arbitration institutions and courts when handling labor-related disputes.

Authorities said the cases would help “correct illegal behavior of employers” and “protect workers’ rights.” Chinese labor law stipulates daily work shifts should not exceed eight hours or over 44 hours a week on average..…

Sixth Tone

China’s Top Court Says Grueling ‘996’ Work Schedule Illegal

Fan Yiying

See also

Children's liberation.

Called shuangjian, or “double reduction,” the policy package aims to decrease the amount of time children in grades one through nine spend on homework and extracurricular classes, and follows other recent efforts to lighten Chinese couples’ childcare burdens and boost the country’s ebbing birth rate.

So far, however, many parents tell Sixth Tone the reforms have brought them nothing but anxiety. As their children’s schedules are more exhausting than ever, parents themselves are in a frenzied free-for-all to secure spots at a shrinking number of extra-curricular classes. To many, actually reducing their child’s after-school activities is not an option.

"Tiger" parents.

A Is for Anxiety: Tutoring Clampdown Tests China’s Parents
Ni Dandan

What is ISIS-K? Two terrorism experts on the group behind the deadly Kabul airport attack and its rivalry with the Taliban —Amira Jadoon and Andrew Mines

You can't tell the players without a score card.

The Conversation
What is ISIS-K? Two terrorism experts on the group behind the deadly Kabul airport attack and its rivalry with the Taliban
Amira Jadoon, United States Military Academy West Point, and Andrew Mines, George Washington University

Explainer: what is shariah law and what version of it is the Taliban likely to implement? — Zuleyha Keskin and Mehmet Ozalp

Short backgrounder on the origin, development and state of shariah law and how the Taliban may implement it this time.

The Conversation
Explainer: what is shariah law and what version of it is the Taliban likely to implement?

Zuleyha Keskin, Associate Professor, Charles Sturt University and Mehmet Ozalp, Associate Professor in Islamic Studies, Director of The Centre for Islamic Studies and Civilisation and Executive Member of Public and Contextual Theology, Charles Sturt University (Australia)

How Paradigm Blindness Leads to Bad Policy — Andrew Sheng and Xiao Geng

Though we live in a highly complex, networked world, the paradigm that guides policymaking is largely linear, mechanical, and “rational.” This leaves us blind to the obvious – including our own blindness – and vulnerable to conceptual traps and collective-action problems....

Must-read.  It's short and to the point. The main point is that societies are complex adaptive systems that are more suitably represented in terms of organic models than mechanical models. The Western tradition focuses on mechanical models, whereas the Chinese tradition focuses on organic models.

Project Syndicate
How Paradigm Blindness Leads to Bad Policy
Andrew Sheng, Distinguished Fellow of the Asia Global Institute at the University of Hong Kong. a member of the UNEP Advisory Council on Sustainable Finance, and a former chairman of the Hong Kong Securities and Futures Commission; and Xiao Geng, Chairman of the Hong Kong Institution for International Finance and professor and Director of the Institute of Policy and Practice at the Shenzhen Finance Institute at The Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen

John Harris - The Taliban is Lying, Don't Believe Them

John Harris - The Taliban is Lying, Don't Believe Them

MMT ≠ QE — Stephanie Kelton

MMT is not and has never been about getting central banks to "print money" for the government

The Lens
MMT ≠ QE

Stephanie Kelton | Professor of Public Policy and Economics at Stony Brook University, formerly Democrats' chief economist on the staff of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee, and an economic adviser to the 2016 presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders

Now This News -. Iceland Sees No COVID-19 Deaths Since May

 Before vaccines were introduced in Iceland there were 30 deaths, but none since.

 Clarisa Diaz - What Iceland’s rising Covid-19 case count tells us about vaccine efficacy

Iceland provides a case study for how an effective vaccine rollout perhaps doesn’t guarantee herd immunity but prevents hospitalizations and deaths 

Quartz 

What Iceland’s rising Covid-19 case count tells us about vaccine efficacy

D.T. Doctrane - Israeli Data Demonstrates the Importance, and the Limits, of Vaccination

Antivaxxers are using similar techniques as climate change deniers to misrepresent data. 

I recently saw a misleading presentation of COVID data pertaining to Israel. In this post I’m sharing several graphs that I made to counter this misleading image.

Israel is currently a popular object of those committed to an anti-vax narrative because a high proportion of the population is fully vaccinated and cases there are currently spiking. The situation is obviously concerning. However, it is being misrepresented to feed anti-vax sentiments, which are dangerous. Epidemiological study shows that widespread vaccination is key to taming the vaccine, although not in isolation.

The table being circulated by anti-vaxx1ers presents this data in ways designed to tell a misleading narrative. First, the table left out the data for the 12-15 and 16-19 age groups, which is already telling. Second, the choice of a table makes the values seem closer together than they are. Third, and most egregious, the table creator cherry-picked data from different datasets to make the values appear closer together than they are. All the data needed for the comparison can be found in a single, downloadable Excel workbook. However, the comparison made using that data is not as alarming as the misleading data

D.T. Doctrane - Israeli Data Demonstrates the Importance, and the Limits, of Vaccination

Links — 26 August 2021

AlterNet
Why ISIS and the Taliban really hate each other
Alex Henderson

The Conversation
Taliban’s religious ideology – Deobandi Islam – has roots in colonial India

Sohel Rana, PhD Student, Indiana University and Sumit Ganguly, Distinguished Professor of Political Science and the Tagore Chair in Indian Cultures and Civilizations, Indiana University

What caused the Taliban to form in the 1990s

Ali A. Olomi, Assistant Professor of History, Penn State     

Sixth Tone

China’s Stressed-Out Workers Are Rediscovering the Art of Meditation

Fan Yiying

A New Tencent Game is Leading the Way in Logging Off Minors

Wang Lianzhang

India Punchline
Quad meets the “Saigon moment”
M. K. Bhadrakumar | retired diplomat with the Indian Foreign Service

Ian Welsh
The Beautiful Stupidity Of Ukraine’s Massive Sell-Off

Greek Reporter
Several Privatized Greek Ports For Sale to Highest Bidder

Patricia Claus

Zero Hedge — Taliban Secures World's Largest Lithium Deposits After US Withdrawal From Afghanistan

Backgrounder.

What is the cost of extraction and associated transaction fees relative to other deposits?

Zero Hedge
Taliban Secures World's Largest Lithium Deposits After US Withdrawal From Afghanistan
Tyler Durden

Economists must grapple with climate tipping points before it's too late — David Roberts

A groundbreaking new model suggests that we've massively underestimated the social costs of carbon...

What is the true cost of carbon, including externality?

Canary Media
Economists must grapple with climate tipping points before it's too late
David Roberts

See also

Wikipedia

Precautionary Principle

John Harris - How China Dominated the Keyboard.

 A really interesting video showing how China found a way to type words four faster than us, despite the fact that their language has thousands of characters, where each character (drawing) represents a word, and so it was initially incredibly slow to type on a QWERTY keyboard. 

The Black Swan Theory

This video explains the probability of a Black Swan event, and how governments aren't preparing for the high probability a Carrington Event which could damage the national grid and telecoms systems. 

The Black Swan Theory

The threat from the Sun: should we be worrying about coronal mass ejections?

Scientists have real concerns that extreme weather on the Sun’s surface could unleash a catastrophe on humanity

2019 study in the journal Scientific Reports found a 0.5-1.9% chance of a Carrington-level storm happening in the next decade. However, Nasa experts expect the Sun’s activity to “ramp up” during the current solar cycle – with a peak in activity due in July 2025. Even in the worst-case scenario, solar storms take one to three days to hit Earth – so with luck, there should be time to prepare.

The Week 

The threat from the Sun: should we be worrying about coronal mass ejections?

Bill Mitchell — ECB nearly comes clean – higher fiscal deficits, higher QE

Last year, the US Federal Reserve dropped a bombshell on mainstream macroeconomics by abandoning the consensus approach to monetary policy, which prioritised fighting inflation over maintaining low levels of unemployment, and, increasing interest rates well before any defined inflationary pressures were realised – the so-called forward guidance approach. It has also been buying massive quantities of US government debt and controlling bond yields in the markets as a result. Attention has been on the ECB to see where it would pivot too and whether it was going to abandon its own massive government bond buying program any time soon, which has been effectively funding the fiscal deficits of the 19 Member-States of the Eurozone. Recent statements have indicated the QE programs in Europe will not be ending any time soon. And an ECB Board member all but tied the scale of the purchasing programs to the size of the fiscal deficits as a guide to how long and how large the QE interventions would be....

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
ECB nearly comes clean – higher fiscal deficits, higher QE
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Sara Hughes and Laura Machan - It's a conspiracy: Covid-19 conspiracies link to psychopathy, Machiavellianism and collective narcissism

I don't believe anyone here have these sorts of traits. I think the health of the economy is primary concern of most people here, which is extremely important too. 

Channel 4 newsreader Jon Snow harassed by 'anti-vaccine passport' protesters in London

Footage of veteran broadcaster Jon Snow being harangued outside the Channel 4/ITN Headquarters in central London this afternoon (August 23) by anti-vaccine protesters. Contains swearing

Channel 4 newsreader Jon Snow harassed by 'anti-vaccine passport' protesters in London

Abstract

A proliferation of conspiracy theories has emerged during the Covid-19 health pandemic. The present study investigated individual susceptibility to conspiracy beliefs and the mediating role of Covid related conspiracy beliefs on links between personality and intentional dissemination of Covid-19 conspiracies and willingness to obtain a Covid-19 vaccine. Specifically, we focused on trait psychopathy, Machiavellianism and collective narcissism, as these traits have previously been linked to heightened conspiracy mentalities. We recruited 406 UK participants to take part in an online survey investigating personality and Covid-19 information. Machiavellianism and primary psychopathy positively predicted general and Covid specific conspiracy beliefs, whereas collective narcissism positively predicted Covid specific conspiracy beliefs only. Covid-19 conspiracy beliefs mediated the negative relationships between all traits and willingness to obtain a future vaccine. We discuss possible implications of these findings and provide direction for future research.

Sara Hughes and Laura Machan - It's a conspiracy: Covid-19 conspiracies link to psychopathy, Machiavellianism and collective narcissism

As the covid contrarians tend not to be anti vaccines in general, but are just sceptical about the new 'rushed' covid ones, and as the  contrarians tend to underplay the seriousness of C19 while over playing the dangers of vaccines, this research below might not really apply to them. 

'Anti-Vaxxers' May Think Differently Than Other People

In the study published in the journal Vaccine, doctoral student Mark LaCour and Dr. Tyler Davis suggest some people find vaccines risky because they overestimate the likelihood of negative events, particularly those that are rare.

The fact that these overestimations carry over through all kinds of negative events — not just those related to vaccines — suggests that people higher in vaccine skepticism actually may process information differently than people lower in vaccine skepticism, said Davis, an associate professor of experimental psychology and director of the Caprock FMRI Laboratories 

Anti-Vaxxers' May Think Differently Than Other People

Bill Mitchell — Immanuel Kant on money and more

So Kant was a chartalist. Who knew? I am a philosopher and I didn't.

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Immanuel Kant on money and more
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

Hassan Akkad - Britain's Covid Strategy

Britain failed to close its borders at the beginning of the pandemic to prevent further Covid infections. 

 It's not easy to compare countries on their strategies on deeling with Covid as there is so many different variables, but this could be one reason why Britain's COVID-19 deaths are much higher than other countries. 

China exhibits monetarist discipline

 

Commies going full monetarist moron:

The U.S. faces the “most severe” inflation risks of any major economy due to the large deviation between the growth of its money supply and GDP since the pandemic, the People’s Bank of China said recently in its quarterly monetary policy report. On Tuesday, Governor Yi Gang said he’ll aim to match money supply and nominal economic growth rates.

China’s charts a more independent course as it sees risks from Fed policies https://t.co/B8UfTXBf1r

— Bloomberg Next China (@next_china) August 25, 2021

Aria Bendix - A year and a half after Sweden decided not to lock down, its COVID-19 death rate is up to 10 times higher than its neighbors

"Sweden's strategy would 'likely result in a massacre' in a different country"

It now has up to 10 times as many COVID-19 deaths per capita as its Nordic neighbors.

Sweden also didn't fare much better economically, suggesting its gamble didn't pay off.

Sweden has recorded more COVID-19 cases per capita than most countries so far: Since the start of the pandemic, roughly 11 out of every 100 people in Sweden have been diagnosed with COVID-19, compared with 9.4 out of every 100 in the UK and 7.4 per 100 in Italy. Sweden has also recorded around 145 COVID-19 deaths for every 100,000 people — around three times more than Denmark, eight times more than Finland, and nearly 10 times more than Norway.

"They underestimated the mortality tremendously," Claudia Hanson, an associate professor at Sweden's Karolinska Institute, told Insider

In a paper published in September 2020, philosophers Mirko Farina and Andrea Lavazza argued that many lives could have been saved if Swedish health authorities had followed the strategy of their Nordic neighbors.

"On paper they're all good scientists, but de facto in practice, most of them end up missing some basic human values," Farina told Insider.

Their paper also argued that Sweden's low density and small population — combined with residents' trust in national authorities — likely prevented a deadlier outcome. If a denser, more populous country like Italy were to adopt Sweden's strategy, they wrote, it would "likely result in a massacre."

Business Insider

Aria Bendix - A year and a half after Sweden decided not to lock down, its COVID-19 death rate is up to 10 times higher than its neighbors

The Telegraph - If Sweden’s Covid strategy is such a disaster, why is it still so popular?

 A counter view on Sweden.

Sweden looks good compared to Britain, but bad when compared to its neighbours. More to come. 

If you look only at Covid deaths then Sweden does as badly as Britain, at least in the first wave (not the second, which is very much still ongoing). But factor in collateral damage, and things change. Studies of all age-adjusted deaths – not just deaths from the virus – shows an increase of just 1.5 per cent in Sweden last year: England’s were up 10 per cent. Excess deaths among under-65s actually fell in Sweden but rose sharply here. A lockdown effect, or only a coincidence? It’s hard to tell. But in Sweden, such jigsaw pieces matter: it always was about the whole picture.

Judging economic damage is easier. By minimising disruption, Sweden’s economy shrank by 3 per cent last year: Britain’s plummeted by 10 per cent. Sweden’s budget, published yesterday, envisages the economy making a full recovery from the pandemic by Christmas. Britain is shooting for mid-2022, even with our vaccine success. The cost of the pandemic (measured by extra public debt) is heading for £7,700 per head in Britain by next year, more than twice as much as in Sweden. Per capita, they (still) have less Covid death.

The Telegraph - If Sweden’s Covid strategy is such a disaster, why is it still so popular?

The Lancet - The Swedish COVID-19 strategy revisited

 Sweden’s failing strategy - a virus breeding hothouse.

As of April 16, 2021, more than 13 700 people have died from COVID-19 in Sweden. The country has one of the highest infection rates in western Europe according to Our World in Data COVID-19 statistics, with 606 new infections per million per day, while its neighbours Denmark, Finland, and Norway reported 115, 62, and 112 new infections per million per day, respectively (April 15, 2021). New and more infective and deadly variants have taken over, and by April 15, 2021, the UK SARS-Cov-2 variant was supected to have caused 75–100% of all new cases in all regions. This indicates more rapid spread, more deaths, and that more young people will be affected, with intensive care units already at full capacity in some regions.4

While other countries are closing down in response to this new surge in cases, Sweden is opening up—high schools were opened on April 1, 2021. To continue on the same trajectory in the face of current trends, without timely action by agency and government leadership, raises concerns about governance and accountability, and ultimately about fundamental ethics and values.

The Lancet - The Swedish COVID-19 strategy revisited

Yabeer Bar-Yam - THE ZERO COVID STRATEGY BENEFITS THE ECONOMY AND ACCELERATES RECOVERIES

 THE ZERO COVID STRATEGY PRESERVES FREEDOMS MORE EFFECTIVELY

Yebeer Ban-Yam is a physicist who studies pandemics 

Here's the research - but some people prefer short term freedom which only makes thing worse in the long run. 

44 times more deaths, 2021 second-quarter GDP set back several years, weakly defended freedoms, reduced mobility: the G10 anti-Covid strategy is on the losing end in every respect

Institut économique Molinari has issued a new study on the lasting value of Zero Covid strategy

The study compares the G10 countries that have opted for a mitigation strategy with three OECD countries that have applied the Zero Covid strategy (Australia and New Zealand) or a similar strategy (South Korea).

The elimination strategy continues to produce the best results, challenging the widespread notion that it was necessary to choose between preserving public health, the economy or freedoms. Far from being in contradiction, these goals are complementary and aligned.

The G10 countries have been hit much harder by the pandemic than the countries that have chosen Zero Covid or similar strategies and that form a representative benchmark (82 million people in economically advanced democracies).

In 2020, countries applying the Zero Covid strategy had almost returned to normal economic activity. Their GDP was down only slightly (-1.6%) compared to 2019. Meanwhile, the decline in GDP was greater (-5%) in G10 countries that had not eradicated the virus.

Zero Covid is a cost-effective economic investment with lasting positive effects. In the first quarter of 2021, the GDP of the Zero Covid countries grew compared to the fourth quarter of 2019 (+1.4%). 

In the countries that did not eradicate the virus, GDP decline remained significant compared to the fourth quarter of 2019 (-3.3%).

By 2021, none of the G10 countries had recovered their pre-crisis quarterly GDP levels, 

with the exception of the United States, while Australia, New Zealand and South Korea had done so.

THE ZERO COVID STRATEGY PRESERVES FREEDOMS MORE EFFECTIVELY

The Zero Covid strategy costs less in terms of civil liberties.

An analysis of the data that make up the Stringency Index indicates a clear advantage for the Zero Covid countries over the other G10 countries in terms of freedom

The OECD countries applying Zero Covid or similar strategies – Australia, South Korea and New Zealand – have had a restriction level four points lower than the G10 countries over the last year-and-a-half (52 versus 56 in the Stringency Index).

Conversely, the stop-and-go alternance in G10 countries, a consequence of the virus mitigation strategy, leads to a periodic retrenchment of freedoms, reflecting measures to contain the pandemic. As long as the virus continues to spread, freedoms are going to be restricted.

Twitter 

https://twitter.com/yaneerbaryam/status/1430214242913898496?s=19

SECRETLY Working Multiple Remote Jobs | Erasing The Middle Class

 David Graeber wrote a book about BS jobs, but it did not make a lot of sense to me as I was being worked to death in my blue collar job, but so were the middle managent. Work just seemed to take over life. My manager was putting in so many hours that he said the cleaners earnt more than him. But according to this guy there are plenty of BS jobs in the American tech industry. 

The day that changed everything. In a wild sequence of events starting with Dr. Fauci’s testimony that morning, and ending with the NBA canceling their entire season, this day is widely accepted as the start of the pandemic. Unknown to Fauci, to Rudy Golbert, and to Ton Hanks, this day also ushered in a new era of life where the typical workday for millions of individuals around the world changed forever. 

With their hand forced by the pandemic, a large majority of white-collar management made the decision to transition their companies to work from home. Millions of people quickly adjusted to remote work. At first, they were bored, or maybe they got worried about lay-offs, or more commonly they just got tired of working extra hard for a small raise every year. Soon they got offered another job, and now they have a secret. 

For a small group of hard-working white-collar employees, in industries like tech, banking, and insurance, a new trend is emerging that is both troubling and genius. This small group has discovered a loophole to double their salary. Working two full-time remote jobs and keeping it a complete secret. 

Al Franklin - Tucker Carlson - Most COVID-Vaccinated American?

 How Many Americans Have Died of COVID Because of Disinformation from Tucker Carlson?

Lars P. Syll — Keynes was not a Keynesian. He was a Post Keynesian!

Keynes quote. "Keynesian" subsequently came to be understood in terms of John Hick's interpretation of the General Theory based on IS/LM.

Lars P. Syll’s Blog
Keynes was not a Keynesian. He was a Post Keynesian!
Lars P. Syll | Professor, Malmo University

Wage Inflation — Brian Romanchuk

Note: This is an unedited excerpt section from my latest manuscript, which is an inflation primer. Unlike my previous writings, this planned book largely stays clear of theoretical disputes, and mainly discusses what we know for sure about inflation. This section dips a bit into theories — mainly to say to read about them elsewhere.

I view this text as very preliminary. I will take a long look at it again once I have the rest of the book put into place. My plan is that the book was supposed to be a short report, and it may be that I am near the end of overall text structure. I then need to fill in more details - data from other countries, more references - but I will do that once all the sections are assembled. There is no point tracking down data and references for a section that ends up getting deleted completely.

Bond Economics
Wage Inflation
Brian Romanchuk

What Every American Needs to Know About the Congressional "Pay-For" Game (Parts 1 & 2) — Stephanie Kelton

This newsletter is called The Lens for a reason. My research and policy analysis is grounded in a macro framework known as MMT or Modern Monetary Theory. MMT is the lens through which I analyze the macro economy and evaluate economic policy. Please bear that in mind as you read on.

The Lens
What Every American Needs to Know About the Congressional "Pay-For" Game (Part 1)

What Every American Needs to Know About the Congressional "Pay-For" Game (Part 2)
Stephanie Kelton | Professor of Public Policy and Economics at Stony Brook University, formerly Democrats' chief economist on the staff of the U.S. Senate Budget Committee, and an economic adviser to the 2016 presidential campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders

The Financial Times gets to grips with MMT. — Ralph Musgrave

I don't link to FT here since it has a paywall. Here is a link to Ralph's comments on the FT article on MMT.

RALPHONOMICS
The Financial Times gets to grips with MMT.
Ralph Musgrave

Bill Mitchell — The Pandemic, Government Failures and Accumulated Social Wreckage

Today, we have a guest blogger in the guise of Professor Scott Baum from Griffith University who has been one of my regular research colleagues over a long period of time. Today he is writing about impact on local communities of the current Covid-19 outbreak in Sydney. Over to Scott …

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
The Pandemic, Government Failures and Accumulated Social Wreckage
Scott Baum, Professor of Urban and Regional Analysis, School of Environment and the Cities Research Institute, Griffith University

Bus driver shortages hitting US schools

 

Yeah …. Fed should “take away the punch bowl!”….  things are just going too well….

Bus driver shortages are latest challenge hitting US schools https://t.co/o21yB9o5at pic.twitter.com/AncHB2mZLG

— Blimling&Associates (@Blimling) August 23, 2021

USDC stable coin to use 100% USD and UST reserves

 

They get to keep any interest they earn unlike the Fed….

A group including Coinbase Global says all reserves of stablecoin USDC will shift into cash and short-term U.S. Treasuries, forgoing riskier investments https://t.co/lL587L7t60

— Bloomberg Markets (@markets) August 23, 2021

Sinema: Simply won’t back a $3.5T spending bill

 

Dems still have a lot of work to do on Senate side…

Sen. Kyrsten Sinema still opposes her party's plans for a $3.5 trillion, party-line spending bill. And she’s not up for a negotiation about it.https://t.co/G20lcO45KD

— POLITICO (@politico) August 23, 2021

Alibaba chart

 

Commie bloodbath wow,,,,

Will mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines Be China’s Ticket Out of Isolation? Ye Ruolin

Kind of like developing chips. There's a steep learning curve and existing patents.

Sixth Tone
Will mRNA COVID-19 Vaccines Be China’s Ticket Out of Isolation?
Ye Ruolin

SciTechDaily — Simple New Way to Desalinate Water Using Solar Energy

Ural Federal University (UrFU) power engineers have developed a new desalination technology. It will significantly reduce the cost of desalination and quadruple the volume of production. The results of the research are published in the journal Case Studies in Thermal Engineering.…

SciTechDaily
Simple New Way to Desalinate Water Using Solar Energy
Ural Federal University

‘Forever war’ benefiting Afghans? Follow the money — Pepe Escobar

Backgrounder.

Asia Times
‘Forever war’ benefiting Afghans? Follow the money
Pepe Escobar

Chamath - Everyone is WRONG About China

 This is fascinating! 

The oligarchs have too much control in the US : They have privatised free speech, banned Trump, cancelled people, and stopped many of us from saying what we want by banning us from their social media (Alex Jones). The CPC saw what was happening and so put a stop to it in China.

The investor here says China's population will fall from 1.5B to about 3/4 of a Billion, and the CPC has decided that the best way to cope with this is to nationalise all of the Chinese companies.

Bill Mitchell — Keynes on national self-sufficiency

One of the emerging discussions is what will the post-coronavirus world look like both within nations and across nations. There is a growing thread about the worries of increased state authoritarianism as governments have imposed an array of restrictions. There is also an increasing debate about the need for nations to return to enhanced national self-sufficiency to avoid the disruptions in the global supply chain that the pandemic has created. In 1933, John Maynard Keynes gave a very interesting lecture on this topic in Dublin. In this blog post, I consider that lecture and assess its currency in the contemporary setting.…

Bill Mitchell – billy blog
Keynes on national self-sufficiency
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia